


Enigma

by Jay2Noir



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Armitage Hux is a Jerk, F/M, Fallout 4 crossover, Memory Loss, Protective Kylo Ren, Reconditioning, Smut, Tag As I Go
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-30
Updated: 2019-11-22
Packaged: 2020-10-29 09:55:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 20,698
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20794739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jay2Noir/pseuds/Jay2Noir
Summary: You, Pipa0401 as you have been named, have no memories. This makes you valuable according to the people who you stand before. According to them, you're a perfect fit for a human meal deliverer thanks to the General's demands to remove the droid that currently brings him his food. It all seems so easy, and everyone around you makes it seem easy. At least until you find yourself taking solace in The Supreme Leader of all people. You're told he's even more ruthless than the General, the man who torments you every moment you're with him. But in your times of weakness and need, you find yourself gravitating toward him. Things change, however, when your memories come flooding back to you, ones that are absurd and ones that make no sense to you or him. Life gets even more challenging when the memories you had made in the order are spontaneously erased, and tensions rise between you and Kylo. Does he love you? Do you love him? How could you have forgotten that he confessed his love to you just two days ago? Or was maybe that was just another false memory of yours.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> I've been sitting on top of this story for a few months now. Life's been rough recently and I just couldn't hold it back anymore. I've got a few chapters written up and I'm planning on posting them over time. Enjoy!

It had been a rough argument, there was no doubt about it. Whenever Kylo caught you in these lies, as he called them, he was so passionate about them. You try to tell him that what you were telling him was the truth, that you didn’t know why your narratives changed so often, but he never believed you. The two of you would shout at each other, Kylo would tell you that he didn’t trust you and, as far as he knew, you could be here to hurt him. Every time he took the conversation that route you’d break into tears. You had never told him, but you loved Kylo. You had admired him for as long as you could remember and it absolutely crushed you when he made that accusation.

You ran up the stairs sobbing, cursing yourself for this obscenity that had been laid upon you. You had no reason to lie to him, yet every detail that came from your mouth was different. You spent a lot of your time hating yourself, wondering why Kylo would even waste his time on you. You were nobody, just the person that delivers his meals when he ordered them, and yet here you were. In his personal quarters almost every moment of the day, dining with him, making love to him, and just wishing he loved you just like you loved him. You wiped tears out of your eyes as you slammed the bedroom door shut behind you, thinking maybe it would be best if you left, if you put in a request to be transferred to the Finalizer instead of continuing your duties on the Supremacy. 

Maybe he was only using you. Maybe that’s what all this mind mapping and memory training was all about. First he wanted you just for your body, then when he figured out there was something _ wrong _with you that he could use to his advantage, he wanted to weaponize you. It was heartbreaking, and you knew it’s not what you wanted. You just wanted to be normal, to go about your days with Kylo normally without these trust issues, but obviously that wouldn’t happen. As you shut the bathroom door behind you and run some cool water on your face, you resigned your days of being with Kylo to be torturous, decided that enough was enough and you’d be leaving to tell your supervisor that you wanted to be transferred immediately. 

You had just gone about dabbing the tears out of your eyes with some toilet paper when there was an abnormal feeling in your gut. It felt like some pretty intense gas, if gas could take the form of a jagged rock inside of your intestines. It was enough to make you stop what you were doing and cringe. By the time it had faded away you were staring down at your uniform shirt, wondering what the hell that could have been about. You had never felt any pain like it before, and just when you were about to shrug it off and go back to wallowing in your self-pity the same pain hit you once again. This time, however, it was much more painful.

It felt like you were being stabbed in the gut, like something sharp was being driven right into your flesh. You gargled, doubled over as the pain radiated up into your chest while the pain in your gut continued to worsen. You were blind-sighted, had no idea what was wrong with you or what you should even be doing. Everything was telling you to get Kylo, to tell him to take you to the medbay, but you thought there was a chance for him to further humiliate you and call you a liar yet again and decided against it. You would have to deal with this on your own, make it to the medbay by yourself and seek treatment. 

You turn, your hand on your abdomen as you start to stagger toward the door but more waves of intense, now completely unbearable pain overtook your actions. You manage to slam your hand onto the doorknob to hold yourself steady, a blood-curdling scream shooting out of your throat against your will. It was as if you were being stabbed, the sharp pain grew and grew from inside of you and you wondered if you were even going to make it out of this situation alive. 

A new sensation emerged from all this madness: The feeling of something solid moving throughout your belly. It was right at the center of your belly, and the more it moved the more painful it got. You leaned against the door while lifting up your shirt only to be horrified when you saw there was a huge, unnatural bulge in the center of your stomach. It was like you were giving birth through the wall of your stomach, the lump grew and grew, stretching its way out of you and leaving you speechless the entire time. You didn’t hesitate to reach down and tap the growth, found it was one solid mass that was, indeed moving forward out of your belly. You stared down at it helplessly as it continued on, could only whimper and groan as quietly as you could before the unthinkable happened.

A flash of white-hot pain overtook you as your flesh finally gave out under the pressure of the object. In the blink of an eye a small tear appeared in your abdomen and blood had spattered all over yourself and the bathroom floor, and once you got over the shock of seeing yourself split open you had to come face to face with the thing that was causing you pain.

It fell to the floor, leaving a golfball-sized hole in your stomach and a never-ending stream of questions in your mind. On one hand your pain had diminished to only the searing pain from the tear in your stomach, yet on the other you were now staring right at the object that caused your suffering to begin with. It was coated with your deep red blood, and below the blood it looked to be made up of metal. You hesitated for a moment, but figured you had nothing to lose at this point. The object had literally fallen out of you, you at least had to try and identify it. Slowly you dropped to a squat, reached in between your feet and seized the object in your shaky hands.

The first thing you noticed about it was how heavy it was. It was solid, fit just in the palm of your hand and was still warm from its birth. Before examining it any further you took a look down at your wound. It wasn’t profusely bleeding and it didn’t seem like your organs were becoming displaced so you thought you were safe to take the extra time in looking it over for a few seconds. You turned your attention to the object, flipping it over until a small screen with flashing red text caught your eye. It was scrolling across the object, flashing so that it kept your attention. The text that scrolled across was haunting, chilling your bones as you read over every word:

_ YOU ARE IN DANGER. WE ARE IN FEAR FOR YOUR LIFE. MOVE TO SAFETY AND WAIT FOR-- _

A hefty knock at the bathroom door caused you to jump, dropping the metal object to the floor in a puddle of your blood. “Is everything okay?” Kylo shouted from the other side. “Do you need help with something?” Behind you the door handle jiggled, Kylo was trying to make his way in. Your breath stopped and you stepped away from the door, wondering what you were supposed to do. Would Kylo even believe that this happened to you, or would he think it was some stupid prank? Would he take this as seriously as he should, or would he completely overreact and make ridiculous demands of you and the medical staff like he sometimes did? Did you even want to let him in at all?


	2. Chapter 1

Your earliest memory was only but one thing: Standing in front of the First Order’s job assignment leaders and hearing the words, “Nutritional Delivery, clearance level 3.” Nothing, absolutely nothing, else existed in your memory other than standing in front of those four men and women and hearing them call out your assigned name, age, and ‘reconditioning date.’ You remembered feeling sick to your stomach, like you had forgotten something important and had no idea what it was. Even hearing your name come from the oldest woman’s mouth was unclear and foreign to you. Had your name always been a strange combination of letters and numbers?

“Why are you giving her a level three clearance?” The rightmost assignment leader asked the one that assigned you. “There hasn’t been a food runner in level three in months. Does level three even require a food runner anymore?” The man asked, completely confused.

“Her papers state that her reconditioning went flawlessly, when tested she could recall zero percent of the information that was presented before reconditioning. She is a perfect candidate for such a high level position and, even if something does go wrong, another round of reconditioning would not be out of the question.” The three other judges looked at her suspiciously until she spoke up once again, sighing and rolling her eyes at the paperwork that sat before her. “The General is requesting his meals be delivered by hand anyway. He says the droids have been running too slowly for his liking.” 

“This is a complete waste of our resources!” The younger man on the very end slammed his hand upon the paperwork in front of him. “This girl could be placed in the records office for crying out loud! She could be enrolled in the medical experimentation program! Why is it that the General gets to pull our newly reconditioned pupils for his selfish needs?” The man was so angry and his words were so forceful that you stumbled backward away from him. You hadn’t meant to whimper so loudly, but given the fact that you had no prior memories, didn’t know who you were, who these people were, or who the people were that they were talking about, you thought you were well within your right to be horrified. 

Their eyes met yours and you shivered upon the stage for everyone to see. One woman giggled, one took pity on you while the two men were clearly agitated by the situation. “Because he is the man we answer to and what he says goes.” The woman who was pitying you said. She reached over the desk, across the woman she sat next to and snatched the paperwork from the man closest to her and began scribbling something onto it. “Send her to the kitchen to start her training. Case closed.” The man sneered at her, but it would seem she won this battle over your future. 

“Bring out the next applicant, I guess.” He rolled his eyes, opening a folder and pulling out a new set of paperwork. His eyes met yours, and for the first time you were in fear of what was going to happen to you. “Go on, then.” He shouted, shooing you away. “Go back to where you came from and prepare for your new job.” You gasped at his harsh tone, worried that he would jump up and chase you off the stage. You weren’t sure where you were supposed to go, but the door you saw another young man dressed similarly to you come out of seemed like a good bet. You sped walked down the stage, taking a nervous glance at the man you were walking past. He didn’t do or say anything to you; didn’t even look at you. It was horrifying, and by the time your bare feet touched the carpet behind the stage, you were introduced to a whole new world.

There were hundreds of people that looked like you milling about. Sure they had different hair types and colors, different eye and skin colors, and different body types, but they all were dressed exactly like you. The women wore grey tops that covered their breasts and grey shorts that went to their knees, and the men only wore grey shorts. The women’s hair varied in length; women with long hair had it tied up in a tight bun while women with shorter hair had it neatly trimmed and styled above their ears. The men all looked the same: buzzed straight and neat. As you stood admiring the line of other people waiting to go out on stage, one that you presumably had to stand in as well but still had no recollection of, you lifted your hand to your hair and found that it was knotted in a bun. Your hair was long, but you didn’t know what color it was.

“Quit blocking the door, recruit.” A rotund woman dressed in all black came running up to you with a clipboard in her hand, took you by the wrist and forcefully pulled you from the doorway. “These damn shelled recruits. They lose 100 percent of their memory and act like newborn babies.” Once she had gotten you far enough away from the line and the door she tossed you into a corner and stood over you, retrieving a tablet from her hip and swiping and tapping on it. “Recruit PIPA0401. Assigned to meal delivery on level three.” She cut her eyes at you from over her tablet, as if your mere existence was enough to annoy her. You were nervous, seconds away from a breakdown. You had no choice in this ‘assignment,’ so if it were up to you, you would have run far, far away from wherever you were. “The General is going to have a lot of fun with you.” She said with a laugh that left you so unsettled. It was so evil and maniacal, as if she enjoyed seeing you standing there cowering in her shadow. It was clear that everyone you had come in contact with knew that you were lost, missing key information and, as a result, were terrified beyond belief. But even still, no one chose to help you.

“Follow me, recruit.” She said, turning and walking toward the far end of the room you were in. You did your best to keep up with her through the crowd of other people. She was incredibly rude; refusing to say excuse me to anyone that was in her way. You kept your head down as you walked past other men and women, some looked just as nervous and distressed as you were. You wondered if all of these people were just as lost as you, had their memories wiped and had no idea who they were or where they were. Everything was so overwhelming and you had no idea how you should be processing it. 

The woman led you over to an isolated group of six men and women who were all huddled next to a huge door. Leaning against the wall, however, stood a man that stuck out like a sore thumb from everyone. He was much taller than everyone that was dressed like you and wore a white lab coat. He, just like the woman that had led you over here, was working on a tablet that, when he noticed you walking toward him, he holstered to his hip. 

“Is this the last kitchen recruit?” He asked, staring down his nose at you. You got the idea that everyone who wasn’t essentially a clone of you was in charge knew more about where you were than you did. You should have felt safe with them, but you could tell by his uncaring scowl that he was not here to be your friend.

“Yes. Hopefully you won’t need any more recruits after this batch.” The woman said as she shoved you toward the crowd. The people broke from out of your way, you told yourself that they were making room for you, but in reality, they were probably too afraid to touch you. They were strangers to you. You were a stranger to them. Nobody knew anyone, and you were certain that it was causing everyone distress. 

“Not like the ole F.O. is quote-unquote,  _ recruiting _ , much of anyone else these days.” The man said to her, rolling his eyes as he walked away. “Follow me, people. Welcome to your new life in the fucking First Order.” He said, and you were left thoroughly confused. What did he mean by saying they, the ‘F.O,’ whoever, wasn’t recruiting anyone? Weren’t you just recruited somehow? It unsettled you to think that you didn’t remember this recruiting process, how it happened, who recruited you, and whatnot. You were starting to suspect that there was some foul play somewhere along the line, and your memory loss absolutely killed you.

Your group was lead from the spacious room, out into the hallway where you trailed a little behind everyone else. You felt like you were forgetting something crucial, like you should have remembered  _ something  _ about how you got here, or who you were for that matter. Among the silence of the people around you, you took the time to think. Perhaps this was all some misunderstanding. You didn’t belong here. There was some mix-up. The thoughts were comforting in a way, but the discomfort came when you realized that, even if it was a mix up somewhere along the lines, you couldn’t remember where you came from. Did you have a family? Parents? Siblings? Friends that would be looking for you? It haunted you to think you had nothing, but that was all your mind would tell you. You swallowed as you wrapped your arms around your cold body; surely with temperatures this cold this organization, this  _ First Order  _ place, would have provided you with heavier clothing. 

The people that passed you all looked the same. They wore long, thick, black coats with black hats that somewhat concealed their angered scowls. They, just like a lot of the other people you had seen back in the ‘Recruitment Room,’ all looked like they were miserable. You couldn’t imagine what was bothering every single person that passed by you, and, once again, you wonder where exactly you were. Would you end up just like these people? Would you be just as miserable and sad looking? It was a horrifying thought. You went back to hugging yourself and looking down at your plain, grey flat shoes, hoping that soon someone would shed some light on all of your confusion.

It felt like an eternity was spent walking through hallways that all looked the same. Going up and down elevators that left you pinned up against the other members of your group. You wanted so badly to talk to them, to ask them what they knew and if there were any way to get out of here, but you had a sinking suspicion that their memories had been wiped just as yours had. You had no one. You could only rely on those that were leading you around this place.

Eventually, you were led to a large set of double doors, and when the tall man pushed them open you walked into a world of chaos. The entire kitchen was clean and pristine, yet the hustle and bustle going on made everything look completely chaotic. Coupled with almost every type of smell imaginable, the kitchen was hot. Multiple men and women moved back and forth, some carrying nothing and some with their hands full of all kinds of pots and pans full of foods of all colors. Some looked on at you and your group leisurely while others ignored you, too focused on looking stressed out and doing what they’re doing. 

“Got your kitchen recruits.” The man said, holding out his arm as if he were showing you off. “Try not to set the soup specialist on fire again. We don’t get them like we used to.” Amidst the crowd of people, one man stepped out. He was sweaty, dressed head to toe in black chef garb complete with a small black hat upon his disheveled blonde hair. 

“That was just a freak accident.” He said, removing a cloth from his inner pocket and wiping his brow. The man’s skin was tinted pink and it was clear he worked hard at his profession. “How many are there?” He asked, looking over the group and mouthing the numbers as he counted the heads of you and everyone else.

“She’s not one of yours.” The man said to the chef. Suddenly he was standing next to you, yanking you from everyone else and standing you off to the side. “She’s taking the droids place on floor three.” 

“Floor three?” The chef asked, looking skeptically at the man. “Isn’t that the Supreme Leader’s floor?”

“It’s the General. He’s tired of the droids.” You watched as he lifted his brows, looked over at you for a second before looking back to the man.

“Nobody gets to tell that man no, I guess.” He said waving his hand to the corner of the kitchen. “She’ll be the easiest. She just needs a datapad and a cart. The cooks can train her in one day.” You felt so small, so unimportant as these people discussed the likes of you. You took a step back, crossed your arms as you took a cautious look around at the other people that had been led here with you. The only other person that seemed to take notice of your fear was another girl that looked to be about your age. 

“You have to go by yourself?” She whispered to you, causing you to jump at her closeness. You turned and saw her, standing far too close for your comfort yet was the only person seemingly taking pity on you. Her black hair was cut down short and her green eyes shone with compassion. 

“I, I guess so.” You looked back over to the two men who were pointing each other member of your group and explaining what their roles in the kitchen would be. “I don’t even know who I am, or where I am. These people just, just saw me and decided this is where I’m meant to be.” The girl lifted her eyes to the men just as you had, just in time to hear that she was assigned the role of baker. You watched as she shivered, sniffed and lifted her hand to wipe away the first of her tears.

“I don’t even know my name.” She said, speaking a bit louder this time as she lost control of her emotions. “I don’t know where I came from, but I know I don’t want to be here.” Without thinking, you reached down and grabbed her hand. It was spontaneous, automatic in a sense; like you had no control over the action and didn’t know why you did it. While you were contemplating the strange action you noticed the two men had stopped talking and were looking at the two of you. The chef turned and started advancing toward you, gripped your new friend's hand and yanked it away from you. 

“The new recruits are always so cowardly.” He said as he seized your shoulder in his large, sweaty hands. “So moon-eyed and scared over nothing. We all acclimate eventually, girl. And those who don’t are fired out of an airlock, so I would get used to your surroundings as soon as possible.” You gasped at his harsh words, at his inhuman nature to even suggest that not adjusting or not adjusting well would get you killed here in the First Order. He was forcefully leading you toward a door away from everyone else in your group. As he was opening it you tossed one last look over your shoulder at the girl you had been conversing with. She was looking at you horrified as you were dragged away from her. She truly may have been the only friend you could have in this new place you’d have to call home, but you didn’t know if you’d ever see her again.

The room you were forced into was like a break room. It contained a fridge, a counter that ran along two walls, and a microwave that was mounted next to the fridge. In the center of the room was a large round table with only one person sitting at it. The young man had a tablet in his hands and earbuds in his ears, and loud rock music blared from them. He was dressed just like every other person that had been running around in the kitchen, so you didn’t think there was anything special or different about him. But as the door slammed behind you and he looked up at you shaking in fear, it would seem he did have a special interest in you.

“You must be the new deliverer.” He said quite loudly before pulling his headphones out of his ears. “I’m supposed to train you and shit like that, but there’s really nothing to it.” He stood, failing to push his chair back in. “Easiest job on the entire ship if you ask me. Before I was replaced with those damn droids I had it easy. Now I’m a dishwasher and actually have to work.” He rolled his eyes at you, then walked over to the kitchen counter where he pulled out a large metal cart that had previously been hidden from you around the corner. 

“All you’ll need is this,” He spoke as he pushed the cart toward you. “And this.” You watched as he lifted the top of the cart and showcased a brand new tablet sitting on top of where the platters of food were supposed to go. “The tablet is always going to be programmed to show you your route, and you can even use it to get to the kitchen in the morning until you memorize it like us. Set it up for you and everything.” He said as he booted up the tablet. A screen with the phrase  _ Welcome PIPA0401  _ flashed in front of you before being replaced by a simple home screen. He was quick to tap on the navigation screen and show you how to type in your destination, but he was even quicker to exit out of it and pull up the “duties” app. 

“Here is where you’ll find all of your assignments. The Order has programmed yours to automatically default to the kitchen section, and it’ll show you what food needs to be taken where.” He went through the menus on how to request help, how to do this and that until a small red circle lit up on the deliveries tab. “Oh, look at that. Some food’s ready to be delivered.” He tapped on the circle and a plethora of information was displayed. A map of the ship, what food was to be delivered, a count down of how long it was supposed to take to get to the destination and, most importantly, who the food was for. “Looks like Officer Neils needs some ice cream. This one will be easy.” _Ice cream. _You hadn't ever heard of ice cream before, but it looked delicious according to the photo. He started to leave the break room with the cart in tow, and even though you felt like this crash course wasn’t enough for you, you knew you had no choice but to follow him.

“When you get a delivery notification, the food is always ready to go. All you have to do is bring the cart here to the kitchen and they’ll load it up for you." Sure enough, when he brought the cart up to the counter the cooks immediately loaded in a small bowl of pink ice cream with a deep brown sauce and sprinkles drizzled on the top. “There’s different sections of the cart: Cold, hot, and drinks. But like I said, you won’t have to worry too much about that because the cooks load everything up for you. Now all you have to do is follow the map and take it to them.” He closed the compartment and pushed the cart toward you, whispering a quick ‘good luck’ before reaching into his coat pocket and pulling out his headphones again.

“Wait, you’re not going to come with me?” You asked, panicking and gripping the iron bar so hard that your knuckles turned white. The man turned and looked at you over his shoulder, shook his head and hopelessness soared through your entire body.

“Sorry, boss wants your first run to be on your own.” He said, turning back and heading toward the break room again.

“But, but, but what if I get lost?!” You asked, taking a step toward him and reaching out. For him. 

“You won’t get lost if you follow the map. Just chill.” And just like that, the only other person you had considered to be decent in this new environment had vanished. Terrified, you took a look around the kitchen and saw all of the other people you had come here with scattered around. Learning, listening, and being trained properly. Unlike you who only got fifteen minutes of instruction for your new job and was immediately thrown in. You swallowed, looking down at the map which was still counting down until the ice cream was supposed to be delivered. You quickly realized that standing around and trying to get someone to help you wouldn’t be acceptable. You were reminded of the chef’s comment from earlier: people who didn’t acclimate were killed. The thought alone sent your feet clamoring toward the exit, along the red line on the map to your destination. You may not have known who you were, but you were 100 percent certain you would rather be alive and confused than dead floating in space. 

The clock ticked down second by second as you nearly ran along the long, seemingly never-ending corridors. Most of the time you kept your eyes down at the navigation system, and on multiple occasions you had almost pushed the cart into people walking around you. You remained courteous and apologizes to everyone, but it would seem your words fell on deaf ears.100 percent of the people you passed would only sneer at you, roll their eyes, or bark a nasty insult after telling you to watch where you were going. It was awful. When the datapad finally beeped and told you that the door on your right was your destination you let out a huge sigh of relief. There were three minutes and forty five seconds left and you felt like you had made it just in time. 

Tucking your datapad under your arm you reached your hand up to knock on the door and were startled to find that the door opened on its own. You took a step back, looked up and down the halls to see if someone had seen the act take place. You were once again terrified, thinking the officer who lived here would have thought you were breaking into his home. 

When you didn’t see anything or anyone coming you ducked your head inside. The home was small and mostly empty. “Hello?” You called out into the silence. You didn’t see or hear anything, and you briefly wondered if the tablet had brought you to the correct location. Your heart began to race as you wondered what would happen if that were true. What if this wasn’t the correct location and the officer never got his ice cream? You bit down on your lip, started to step out of the home when a sudden flash of black caused you to twitch and stumble all the way out.

“My, my,” The man spoke as you lifted your eyes to his face. “Who are you? How did you open my door?” He scowled at you, scoffed as he looked you up and down. You took another step back, looked down and realized that you wore nothing that identified you. You still wore the bland, grey outfit you were assessed in. You had no name tag and no lines to say, and you worried that too much time was passing. You had to say something. You didn’t want to be killed. 

“I, uh, I work for the kitchen.” You stuttered, swallowing a thick wad of saliva that was causing your voice to crack. “I’m here to bring you your ice cream.” You watched his eyes flick from your head to your toes, then back. The look of anger quickly faded into amusement and soon he was chuckling at your explanation. 

“They’re employing humans to deliver food now?” He asked. But you had no answer for him. “Must have been the General’s idea. Come in. Show me what they taught you.” He stepped aside and you took it as your cue to let yourself in. The entire situation made you incredibly nervous. This was yet another stranger that you knew absolutely nothing about. He was inviting you into his home and you had no idea what his intentions were. Everything about it screamed shady, but you knew that you truly had no choice. You smiled nervously at him as you stepped around the cart, back to the bar where you started to push it into his home; hoping that nothing would go wrong and that you’d walk away with your life and dignity.

You followed the man to his small dining table where he sat down and just stared at you. You figured you were supposed to be doing something, but before you could connect the dots in your head he spoke up for you. 

“The droid always laid the food on the table, hun.” He said, holding his hand out on the table like he was presenting it to you. You whispered a small “oh” as you hurried around to the side where you watched the cooks load up the bowl of ice cream. There was a handle on the side and, luckily for you, the door opened with no issues. White puffs of cold air danced from the fridge, and when you reached for the metal bowl it was chilled so well that your fingers stuck to the sides. You could feel his gaze on you as you set it down in front of him, and you finally felt yourself relax as his attention moved to the delicious looking ice cream. 

“This looks good, but where is my spoon?” He asked, looking up at you accusingly as if you were deliberately hiding it from him.

“Spoon?” you asked, feeling the blood boiling in your cheeks. “They didn’t, they didn’t give me--”

“Look on the top of your cart there. I see a drawer.” You turned to where he was pointing and was shocked to find that he was correct. This would have been something helpful to know going into the job, but you abandoned the idea, blowing it off along with the bad training, or lack thereof, you had already gotten. With shaky fingers you pulled the drawer open and let out a near-silent sigh of relief when a set of different sized spoons, forks, and knives stared back at you. 

“Spoons. Right here. I have your spoon.” You lifted one from the drawer and handed it to him, only to have him point down next to his bowl. You held your breath as you gently set it down where he had pointed and stepped away, hoping that that was everything he needed and you would be released back to the kitchen. But he stared back at you, still expecting something that you were clueless about.

“My napkin?” You cringed. Napkins. Of course. Who would eat ice cream without a napkin? Why hadn’t the guy who trained you included all of this in his short explanation? You felt like a fool in front of this person who was supposed to be prestigious and high ranking in the Order. “Check the other drawer. Next to the silverware.” You jumped back to the bar and pulled the other drawer open, seized the black napkin and placed it next to the spoon. “Wonderful.” He said, finally smiling genuinely at you. “You’re dismissed. And just be thankful that I was the one who taught you all of this and not the General.” You felt yourself going pale as he spoke on, only stopping to lift a spoonful of ice cream into his mouth. “He wouldn’t have accepted any of that behavior at all.” You stepped away from the table, around the cart and began pushing it out of his home. Once again fear penetrated every inch of you down to your bones. You had heard about this General person time after time, and each time he was mentioned it was never in a good light. He scared you and you hadn’t even met him yet.

“Thank you.” You called out to the officer as you slipped through the automatic door. But you got no answer. Truthfully, it was for the best. Your jittery fingers couldn’t tap  _ return to kitchen  _ fast enough, and as soon as the red line lit up on the map you began running toward your destination. Your first delivery hadn’t gone terribly, but it still left you more than scared about your future. Sooner or later you would have to meet this General, and you got the feeling if you weren’t perfect, he would be the one sending you into the airlock with his own two hands.


	3. Chapter Two

When you returned to the kitchen you were told to take yourself and your cart back to the break room where you would have to wait until dinner time for your next delivery. You were still so lost, confused, and scared from your interaction with the Officer, and you would have done anything to have some company while you waited. Your tablet read 2:34 pm and you were told dinner would have to start rolling out by 5:30. Three hours seemed like a long time to wait while doing nothing, yet here you were. Looking from the tablet, to the door, to the cart every few seconds. It was incredibly boring, and even leafing through your tablet and seeing what it had to offer you gave you no entertainment.

You sighed, stared at a fix point at the wall while wondering who  _ you  _ were. It seemed incredibly unfair to you that this organization chose your name and profession, as well as what you were currently wearing and where you would go. You thought briefly about rebelling, about walking out of this bland, colorless room and demanding answers, but the looming thought of death for those who don’t transition well made you think otherwise. You really had no choice but to sit here and wait for instructions. You had no idea what you came from, but as of right now you were to be submissive. Do what the big, bad people above you said to, and don’t ask any questions or step out of line. The General was the boogie man, and he was the last person you wanted to upset.

So you sat. You waited. You stared into space. And you waited. You looked down at your flimsy, grey clothing that hugged you a little too tight in the waist and thighs. You were cold. Why was it that everyone else in the kitchen got an actual uniform, but you got nothing? Was your position in the Order really that unimportant? 15 minutes of training that didn’t even cover everything and no known uniform, yet on your way back into the kitchen you saw some of the people you had been in the group with shimmying on the same black robes the chefs had been wearing. They looked a little more relaxed, less on edge than how you had been just hours before. Even the girl you had held hands with was smiling as she was oriented around her half of the kitchen. But you were here alone. Nobody cared about you. 

You wrapped your arms around yourself and tried to keep warm, lay your head down flat on the table and shut your eyes. You had nothing to daydream about, you had no memories at all. Instead you thought about what you did know. You went through the route in your head. You went through the drawers and what to do when you went to deliver food: First set the food down on the table, then the utensils, then the napkins. It was easy. Food, utensils, napkins. That’s all you had to remember.

Eventually the ice cream is what held your attention. Its pink color. The runny syrup and the colorful sprinkles. It looked delicious, even though you had no idea what ice cream was or even tasted like. But from what you could see, from what you could feel, you could tell it was something desirable. You salivated as you reached into your memories as far as you could go, but couldn’t pull anything past being presented on the stage for your assignment. You sighed, tried to move past the saddening reality and think about something a little more upbeat, but a new sensation took over your thoughts. 

You were cold. Freezing. Unusually frigid all of the sudden. So cold, in fact, that you started shaking right there in the chair. You felt goosebumps rising under your fingertips and knew something wasn’t right. You looked around the room for a blanket, a jacket, anything that would keep you warm, and when you didn’t immediately see anything you could warm yourself with you started to think of an excuse to go into the kitchen. You stood, and before you could even come up with an excuse you started heading toward the door. Surely, as a kitchen staff member, you would be allowed to stand there for just a few seconds to warm up. You inched your way across the floor to the door, clutching yourself the entire way there. This was the coldest you had ever been in the Order, and it seemed so unnatural. 

When you made it to the door, you reached for the handle. You weren’t expecting it to be so cold. You held your hand tight around it, trying to make sense of what was going on. It was growing colder by the second, and soon you found everything around you going black. 

Suddenly you weren’t in the break room. You were somewhere much colder, much darker. And yet, you were warmer. Your body felt as if it were clothed in something heavier than the garments you had previously been wearing, and when your eyes finally adjusted and you realized there was a soft, orange light coming from the center of the room you were now in. You blinked until your eyesight became clear once again, and found that you were sitting in the middle of an igloo.

An  _ igloo.  _ You knew that word. It was your home. You were  _ home.  _ You looked down at your hands that were protected by a pair of pink mittens, and admired your homemade jacket. It was brown with small, sanded down stones for buttons. A smile broke out over your face as you lifted your hands to your head and felt your wooly hat keeping your ears warm. It was wonderful, and what was even more wonderful was the crunching snow coming from right outside of your home. You crawled to the opening where you watched the outside darken as the person entering your igloo blocked the moonlight, and when the smiling face of a woman you knew to be your mother entered you lit up with joy.

From the small, childlike squeals coming from your mouth, you could tell you were young. How young? You couldn’t tell. But it didn’t matter. Because as soon as the all too familiar face, poking out of a heavy coat and large black hat that just barely allowed her light blonde hair to tumble out from beneath it came from the small opening, you ran into her arms. 

“My baby.” She spoke in a language that was different from the one that was spoken here in the Order, yet you could understand it flawlessly. “Your mother has a treat for you.” You fell from your mother’s arms and excitedly looked at what she had to offer you. She held out her hand and there sat a small clump of snow in one of the bowls carved out of bone. It was dyed dark pink with small red berries that sat on top of it. “Have a taste, my baby. I came across these while looking for firewood to keep us warm.” You took the bowl into your mittens and lifted it to your mouth, lapping up some of the dyed snow and instantly glowing when it hit your taste buds.  _ Strawberry.  _ This was a strawberry. You had them before a few months ago when your mother came back from the market with extra money she got from fishing.  _ Strawberries.  _ You loved strawberries! You lapped at the ice cream over and over as your mother removed her heavy coat, and you enjoyed it until you heard an alien voice coming from right in front of you.

“What in the hell are you doing?” In an instant you had gone from the warm and comforting space you had called home to the cold, heartless breakroom you had spent so much time in. Your arm was still up, trying to grip the door handle that had been ripped from your fingers. Now you stood in front of the chef that had dragged you into this room, and he was looking at you like you had lost your mind. 

Your mouth fell open and you immediately backed straight into the table, afraid he was going to punish you for having a memory of your very own. “I, I’m sorry!” You said, scrambling to come up with an excuse for your strange behavior. “I was just looking for some, some heavier clothes. I’m just a bit cold.” You smiled shyly at him, but all he did was roll his eyes at you.

“I suppose we need to get you a uniform like the rest of them.” He pushed past you into the breakroom and immediately went to the fridge. You were confused, didn’t know why they would keep clothing in a fridge. You stepped closer and saw him pull out a deep red bottle, pull the cap off and take a swing. “I think they’re close to having a living quarters cleared out for you near the kitchen, so I’ll make sure they stock your closet with a uniform. Until then, you’re stuck with what you have.” He turned and looked at you over his shoulder, a smug grin caused your skin to crawl. It was like he enjoyed seeing you this way; confused, alone, afraid, and in tight clothing that made you uncomfortable. 

“Came to tell you that the General is requesting dinner to come early.” Your heart leaped into your throat at the mention of the General. He wanted his dinner  _ early?  _ Now you’d have to come face to face with him sooner than you anticipated. It was horrifying, and still he provided you with the least amount of information possible. “Usually when this happens the other people on the floor, you know, the Supreme Leader, Captain Phasma, and whoever else--I can’t keep track anymore--they don’t seem to mind. Grab your cart, you’ll be done early tonight.” He held the door open, waiting for you to do his bidding and bring your cart along with you. 

But your anxiety of finally meeting this man that terrified you so much that you found you couldn’t move. “But what if they do mind?” You asked, trying to buy yourself time or at least a little bit more information of what you were supposed to do. The man was obviously uptight, and you more than anything didn’t want to mess something up and end up on his bad side. 

The man huffed, narrowed his eyes at you. You and your fearfulness were annoying him, and his harsh words were once again running through your mind. “Then you bring the food back to the kitchen and keep it there until they want it.” He spoke loudly and matter of factly, pointing to where you parked your cart and almost immediately thumbing to out in the kitchen. “Now move it! Nobody in the kitchen wants to be on the General’s chopping block because of you.” Behind him you could see some of the other kitchen workers stopping and staring as the man yelled his commands at you. This was embarrassing, and you found the only way you could escape the deafening stares was to step away, get your cart, and get moving.

You stepped over to the small corner and immediately grabbed the cart by the handles, pulled it from the wall and started moving it toward the door. The people watching you had finally broke free and went about their business again, and by the time you had gotten yourself into the hustle and bustle of the kitchen you found yourself turning to the right where you had gone before. 

“Where do you think you’re going?” The chef commented loudly, once again drawing everyone’s unwanted attention toward you. “Load up the main course first, over here!” You turned and found him looking angrily at you, annoyed once again. The snickers that you heard behind you told you that your mistake was a laughable matter, and you find yourself holding back tears as you maneuvered the cart to where it needed to go. 

When it was parked and locked where it was supposed to be, you watched as the cooks loaded up five dishes with an assortment of food on the very top of your cart, covering each dish with its own platter cover before waving you over to the drink counter. Afraid of what the consequences of messing up the General’s food would be, you carefully pushed the cart to where the drinks were kept. All around you people ducked and dodged around the cart, sneering at you if you got too close to them. You wanted to tell them that it wasn’t your fault, that you were just doing what you were told, but you thought it wasn’t worth the breath. Instead you tried to shink yourself behind the cart, to not make eye contact with the people that forced you here to work against your own will and were now thinking of you as a nuisance. 

The kitchen workers threw open the side of your cart and loaded up five different drinks into the cooler. You made a note that the glasses were down there as well. You didn’t have to bring Officer Neils a drink and you didn’t know what the protocol was for delivering drinks. “Do I have to pour it for them?” You asked the man just as he closed the cooler door. The only answer you got was a shrug. 

“Don’t deliver food. Sorry.” He said, pushing your cart away from him toward the other corner of the kitchen. You cringed as you bussed yourself to the more familiar corner and watched as only two desserts were loaded into the fridge next to the drink cooler, where the icecream had gone previously. One was a small plate that had two light brown disks with some dark brown chunks baked into it and the other was a deep brown wedge with equally dark brown frosting on the top. Both dishes looked delectable, but the only taste that was ingrained in your mind was the strawberries from the daydream you experienced earlier. Nothing before you was pink, so you could only assume the dishes wouldn’t taste like strawberries.

“Check your tablet, don’t run late girl.” The man said as he closed the freezer door. Just like the last person, he pushed your cart toward the door and you struggled to hang onto it. You had forgotten all about the tablet until it was mentioned, and the minute you were out of his way you immediately sized the tablet from the pouch hanging from the side of the cart. You frantically tapped and swiped your way around, trying to remember what the man had taught you in the break room. It had only taken you about ten seconds to get to where you needed to be, but in your head it felt like a lifetime.

At the revelation that you only had twenty minutes to deliver General Hux’s food on the third floor, and the GPS was telling you it was going to take you 16 minutes to get there, your heart came to a standstill in your chest. You immediately put your feet into gear nearly racing toward the exit of the kitchen. The earlier you got to the General’s home, the better. You did not want to feel the wrath you were expecting if you were to be late to his home.

You sprinted along the redlined route your GPS was taking you, shook nervously in the elevator at each stop until you reached a third floor where you once again booked it down the quieter hallway. You wondered why the officer you had delivered the ice cream to earlier wasn’t on this floor as well, but from the change in scenery as well as the lack of people around, you assumed more powerful people lived on this floor. You glanced down at your tablet to make sure you were still going in the right direction and saw that you had six minutes and twenty four seconds left before you had to be at his door and the GPS said you were two minutes away. You held your breath as you walked down the corridor, taking note of the plaques on the wall next to the doors. First was Major Torreks, then was Captain Phasma and Lieutenant Farris, and finally at the end of the hallway were plaques that stated Supreme Leader Kylo Ren and General Armitage Hux. 

You gulped just as your tablet dinged to let you know you had made it to your destination when you were facing the correct door. The pit in your stomach worsened as you stepped forward toward his door and you felt as if you had the capacity to vomit on his doorstep. You hadn’t even eaten anything that you could remember, yet you could feel your stomach bubbling and bile rising into your throat.

With no one around, you could easily hear the door unlatch before it automatically opened like the Officer’s downstairs did. Again, you were met with an eerie quiet that sent goosebumps rising throughout your skin. The home was well lit and seemed clean, pristine, and welcoming. It was also much larger and grander than the officer’s home, and you were far more impressed by the strategic and expensive decor. You pushed the cart over the threshold, feeling a lot safer walking in than when you walked into the Officer’s home.

“Excuse me, Mr. General Hux, Sir?” You called out nervously. The only other noise in the room was the sound of the cart rolling and squeaking across the black, wooden floor. You stopped when you got no answer, wondered what you should be doing. In front of his massive floor to ceiling window sat one small table with one chair on the end, clearly making it so that the person, presumably the General, would be eating facing the stars. It seemed rather lonely to you, but who were you to judge? You simply kept going, thinking if you waited next to the table hopefully he’d show up to you. Sitting felt like a bad idea, and standing around outside seemed like a bad idea in case he thought you were late dropping his dinner off. So you stood by the table, your hands clasped at your waist, and waited patiently.

And when he finally showed up, you didn’t receive the warm welcome you were hoping for. 

You heard something click, something whiz coming from behind you. When you turned around you were met by a man holding some sort of weapon on you. The angry and irritated look told you that he meant business, and even though you didn’t recognize what kind of weapon he was pointing at you, you knew he was perfectly capable of hurting you with it in some fashion.

“Place your hands where I can see them.” He said, raising his upper lip as if he were going to pounce on you. You did as you were told, placing your hands on top of your head and turning to face him. Your heart hammered against your ribcage as the danger of the situation became entirely too apparent. He was about to kill you for simply doing what you were told to do; to deliver him food. 

“I can explain, I can--” You started to beg for some kind of understanding, but he would have none of it.

“Don’t you speak unless I tell you to, or I’ll blow a hole clean through your skull, girl.” He sneered, cutting you off and causing you to flinch as he stepped closer. The weapon was now less than a foot away from you, and just as he promised was pointed directly at your forehead. “Now, tell me what you’re doing inside of my private quarters.” He asked, and it felt like you had begun speaking faster than you could think.

“It’s my first day, and they want me to deliver food to you and everyone else in this hall. When I got to your home the door just opened, and the guy downstairs told me just to come in.” Your teeth chattered as you looked him in the eye, but you jumped back when he took yet another step closer to you with his weapon still drawn. “I’m sorry, I called for you but got no answer! I didn’t want you to think I was late, but I--” You were violently cut off by his quick, uninhibited movement toward the cart that you stood next to, seizing your tablet and causing you to scream unintentionally. He lowered his weapon to his hip as he started making his way around your tablet, swiping and tapping just as you did. You took a look at the cart, wondering if you really had to explain yourself when the food he had ordered was sitting right there in front of him.

“They allowed this device automatic access to our personal quarters during delivery times. How irresponsible!” He scoffed, tossing your tablet toward his front door like a meager toy a child was finished with. Sure enough, when the tablet landed on the floor in front of the door, it opened just as he thought it would. “The droid was programmed to knock before it entered, and I expect the same of you.” He sneered, stared at you deep in your eyes before turning and pulling his chair from the table. Very calmly he sat down, folded his hands and placed them on the table. You still sat there frozen as you stared at his weapon that still sat next to him on the table pointed at you, and didn’t move until he lifted his two fingers in the air and beckoning you over. “My food.” He spoke, and without thinking you rushed to your cart.

You placed your hand on the first platter top and then looked at the one next to it.  _ Oh god.  _ You needed the tablet to tell you what he ordered. You lifted your eyes to his front door and took a hopeless look at your tablet that was face down on the floor, wondering if he would he shoot you if you walked over to get it? You lifted the platter of the first meal and saw a plate full of meat, colorful vegetables and potatoes. The meat had some bones protruding from it; the sight coupled with the strong smell repulsed you and only made you even more nervous.

“What did you order, Mr. General sir?” You asked quietly only to have him bark inhumanely at you in response.

“That’s  _ General Hux  _ to you, girl.” You held your eyes shut at his harsh words, expecting him to stand and beat you for your harmless, little mistake. But much to your surprise, he did nothing. Just started barking orders at you just as you learned he would. “I’m not obligated to tell you what I ordered. That’s what your intrusive tablet is for.” You watched as he straightened his head and then waited for you to do your job.

“But you threw my tablet.” You spoke quickly and accusingly, for the first time feeling your anger counteract your fear. 

“Well then I suggest you retrieve it before I report you to the kitchen for insubordination.” You bit down on your tongue as you turned toward the door, weighing your options. The door was still open with your tablet sitting next to it. Maybe you could make a run for it and hope you could hide on the ship for the rest of your life. It seemed more and more reasonable the closer you got to it, but you didn’t want to think of the repercussions you would have to face if you got caught. You bent down to pick it up and jumped when you discovered a pain in your finger. That’s when you noticed the small dusting of glass that existed around your tablet.

When you flipped it over, you were heartbroken. The entire screen had cracks running all throughout it. Parts of the tablet were unreadable as the pixels that ran across the screen were white and you could just barely make out the blinking red zeros that indicated you were out of time in delivering Hux’s food. You held back your tears as you tried to scroll to see what he ordered, but the only words that you could see from his order were “Smoked Salmon” and “Lemon garlic spinach.” You had no idea what either of those things were. 

As quietly as you could you made your way back over to the cart, opening each dish until you reached the third which imitated what little bit of food you could see on your now ruined tablet. The main piece of the meal was pink and red, and that was the only dish that had pink meat on it. You placed the cover back down and lifted the dish, placing it gently down on the table in front of him before immediately going for his utensils in the drawer. “Your food. Your silverware,” You spoke as you laid a fork, a spoon, and a knife down next to him, then turned back around and pulled a napkin out for him. “And your napkin.” You set it on the table next to his knife, then smiled proudly to yourself that you had remembered what you told yourself in the break room.

“I ordered a drink as well.” He sneered at you, crossing his arms and clearly showing you that he was unimpressed with your first day performance. You cringed, lifted the tablet to your face again and tried to scroll on the page you were on as best as you could. The only part of the bottle you could see was the very tip, and the only identifying factor you could see was the neck of the bottle glowing bright blue. You threw open the drink cooler and grabbed the glowing blue bottle almost as quickly as your eye could be drawn to it. 

“Your drink.” You stated as matter of factly as you could, and before he could say it you were bending at the waist retrieving a brand new glass for him. From there, you stood, waited patiently as you watched him lift the cover from his food and over it. Now you had the time to admire the part of him that stuck out most to you: His fiery red hair. There was not a single person that you saw on this ship that had red hair like him. Maybe that’s why he was so stuck up. 

He lifted the fork and knife and began to cut into his salmon, lifted the small piece to his mouth and chewed fervently. The entire time he stared out of the window, concentrating on the stars, ships, and distant planets that could be seen from his home. It was nerve-wracking. What if he didn’t like it and took it out on you? You shifted on your feet, and when he finally lifted his hand to you to wave you away you felt an immediate flood of relief wash over you. “You’re dismissed.” He said as he began to cut into his salmon again. “I expect better of you tomorrow morning, girl.” You watched as he stuck another piece into his mouth, nodded your head and immediately took ahold of the cart. As quickly as you could you high tailed it out of there, happy that your tablet was functioning enough to open the doors. In your short time in the Order, you had never felt safer than you did standing in the hallway outside of the General’s home. 

You took a moment to lean against the wall and relax. You caught your breath, silently thanking the officer you had met earlier that day for giving you a more important run down than the kitchen did. You closed your eyes, almost ready to allow your knees to buckle and to slide down the wall before your tablet managed to ding. Your eyes flew open as the horrifying tone reminded you that you have four other orders you had to deliver, the next being Supreme Leader Kylo Ren’s food. The count down read thirty seconds, but your GPS said you had already arrived. 

You thought that there could be no way he’d be worse than the General. No one but the head chef had even mentioned the Supreme Leader, so you assumed you’d have nothing to lose. This time, as you approached the door and heard it unlock, you knocked. You didn’t want the man to react just as badly as the General did for “intruding.” So you stood and waited, knocked again as the tablet chimed again to let you know that the food needed to be delivered now. You bit down on your lip and knocked on the door again, hoping that it would alert him and he wouldn’t punish you for being late. 

“Come on.” You whispered stressfully under your breath. You shifted on your feet as you took ahold of the cart and pulled it closer to you. The next order had just chimed, alerting you that you had exactly seven minutes remaining to get Captain Phasma their food. You really didn’t want to wait around for much longer.

Just as you were reaching for the door to let yourself in, it swung open and, before your very eyes, stood a very tall, very shirtless, dark-haired man. You gasped as you stared at him while he stared back at you, waiting for some kind of explanation that you were too startled to offer him. “Who are you?” He asked, squinting his eyes suspiciously at you.

“I work for the kitchen. I’m here to deliver your food.” You counted yourself lucky that there were no weapons being pointed at you or any harsh words being exchanged, so you kept calm and spoke as clearly as you could.

“And your tablet didn’t automatically open my door?” He knit his brows down at you and you were instantly full of confusion. 

“N-No?” You said, sounding completely unsure of yourself. “I mean, yeah. It did, but the General pulled a weapon on me for seeing myself in.” The man’s eyes lifted to the General’s door across from him, then he shook his head at your meager explanation.

“The droids used to enter everyone else’s quarters at will. He was the only one that didn’t like that and he should have known that a human being wouldn’t know that right away.” You were speechless. He sounded angry at you for some reason, and the only thing you could say in reply was a quiet apology. He looked at you for a moment before turning and entering his home. “It’s not your fault. Come in.” He assured you before disappearing into his much darker living space. He was much more welcoming than the General was, and you felt a lot better following him into his home. 

“Set it up in the kitchen please. I wasn’t expecting dinner this early and I’m not ready to dine yet.” The request was reasonable, and his tone wasn’t demanding on intimidating. You would have to say that the Supreme Leader was much more pleasant to work with, even though his demeanor was still cold. His home was so dimly lit and you couldn’t see much of anything. His curtains were drawn and he seemed reserved and even more lonely than the General. What was especially confusing was his dining table. From what you could see, it was bigger and contained four chairs instead of just one. Did that mean he had company? 

You entered his kitchen and the lights turned on automatically. It startled you, and you took the time to stop and admire how large it was. For a person who presumably had all of his meals delivered to him, his kitchen was huge and well stocked. It was great, but when you turned to admire even more of it you found he was standing almost directly behind you. 

“Is there an issue?” He asked you, causing blood to rise in your cheeks.

“No, I’m sorry.” You apologized, turning back to your cart where you picked your tablet up. You did your best to navigate it in its state, but it proved to be difficult. You wished you would have knocked on the General’s door. If you had at least the rest of this delivery would have gone a lot smoother. 

After a minute or two of useless tapping on broken and cracked glass, you had finally made it to the Supreme Leader’s screen. The one word you could see from his list was “broiled,” and the photo showed something that was circular and bright red. You felt hopeless, but at least one of the four dishes had to be his and you thought guessing, at this point, was better than asking him what he ordered. You reached for the first dish, but before you could grasp the platter cover he stepped behind you again, startling you and causing you to jump nearly out of your own skin.

“What in the hell happened to your tablet?” He asked, but before you could answer he had snatched it from your hands just as the General did. Instead of tapping on it, however, he just stared at id disapprovingly. “Is this really what they gave you for your first day? How do they expect you to be able to read anything on this thing?” He pressed his finger into the screen only to pull it away with a small shard of glass embedded in his flesh. You were embarrassed, to say the least. He seemed to be disappointed in you. 

In an instant, you were stuck. What if he and the General were friends? What if he didn’t believe you if you told him the General was the one who broke your tablet? What if you got in trouble because he thought you were lying, or even worse: What if he did believe you and confronted the General, and then the General retaliated against you? You thought one small lie wouldn’t hurt anyone, and at least if you did get in trouble for blaming yourself you assumed it would be far less painful than blaming the General. 

“No, I dropped it.” He cocked a brow at you, looking at the tablet momentarily before looking back up at you.

“You  _ dropped  _ it?” He asked, clearly not believing you. “And it caused this much damage?” You only nodded your head in reply. There was a beat of silence before he shook his head, then he placed your tablet on his kitchen counter. “Well, either way, you can’t possibly perform your duties with a destroyed tablet. I’ll have a new one sent to the kitchen.” He stepped aside you and started lifting the tops to each of the dishes, then stopped at the very last one when he had apparently found his meal. He lifted it from the cart and placed it on his counter before rummaging through the cooler and pulling out a bottle of dark liquid and a glass. “Unlike Hux, I’m not proud enough to demand to be served.” He said without looking at you. He rounded the cart and reached into the small freezer, pulling out the plate of disks and placing everything on his counter. 

“I’ll let the remaining staff know that they need to serve themselves since you don’t have your tablet. You’re dismissed.” He said softly, walking back into the dark of his home. 

“But, but wait!” You called out, stepping past your cart and following him out of the kitchen. “I’m new, how will I make it back to the kitchen without my tablet?” He stopped, looked at you from over his broad shoulders for a moment before continuing to walk away from you.

“I’ll order an escort droid. By the time you’re finished with this section it’ll be at the end of the hall waiting for you. You may see yourself out now.” He said, and you felt there was no arguing with his demands. As quietly as you could you walked out of his kitchen, feeling almost naked without your tablet to tell you what to do and where to go next. As you approached the door it still unlocked, leaving you confused yet again. Perhaps there was a second unlocking mechanism in your cart that you didn’t know about. He had given you permission to see yourself out, so you decided it wasn’t worth worrying about. All you had to do was leave and move to the next door down where, hopefully, they would retrieve their own food just as the Supreme Leader said.

With only two out of an almost infinite number of deliveries completed, you couldn’t count any of them as successful. The Supreme Leader was much more pleasant than the General, but you still felt you needed to keep your distance. You still didn’t know anybody here, and after being treated so poorly by nearly everyone you came in contact with, you felt you couldn’t trust anyone else either. 

What you did have, though, was yourself and your one memory. You could carry on the rest of your day knowing that you did at least have a mother at one point, and you could keep your hopes up high that she would come looking for you in this hell hole called the First Order. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter of this will have a crossover with one of my favorite video games. I can't wait to post it next week!


	4. Chapter 3

After delivering the last three meals to the last three people in that hallway, you were surprised to see that the Supreme Leader had kept his word. After leaving the first house you found a droid standing at the mouth of the hallway. “Food deliverer, P-I-P-A-0-4-0-1,” I spoke in a fragmented, monotonic, robotic voice. You couldn’t help but to smile at it as it communicated with you. “I was sent by Supreme Leader Ren to escort you back to the kitchen. If you would, please follow me.” The small, square droid turned around and began to wheel itself forward, and you were happy to follow it. 

Unlike on your way up here, the hallways were mostly empty. Except for the odd stormtrooper here and there, or the group of patrolling storm troopers you saw that walked past you and the droid. It was peaceful, and by the time you did make it back to the kitchen everything had calmed. There were only three or four workers milling about this time; washing dishes, mopping the floor, organizing the counters and fridges etc. Everything was so calm, and as the droid slipped past you and went on its way you started to push your way to the break room where you would park your cart and wait for further instructions. 

Inside the break room you found the head chef, sitting at the table and staring you down. It made you feel uncomfortable, but nevertheless you still smiled at him and moved to push your cart around the corner. “How was your first run?” He asked, tapping his fingers on the table. There was a kind of strain in his voice, one that made you incredibly nervous. It made you realize that you had gotten just a little too comfortable in your unknown surroundings and it probably wasn’t a good idea. 

“It went fine.” You lied, all of the sudden remembering that you were missing your tablet and had to be escorted here by a droid. Ren did say he was going to send a new tablet for you to the kitchen. Maybe that’s what this conversation was supposed to be about. Maybe you were about to receive your new tablet. 

He raised his hand and played with his fingers as you stood just off to the side of the table, and when he lowered his eyelids at you, you immediately knew something was wrong. “Are you sure about that?” He eyed you suspiciously as he questioned you, and all you could do was nod your head. “Really? Because you really put us on the chopping block when the Supreme Leader had to put in an order for a new tablet for you. He said you dropped it and shattered the screen.” Your heart lept in your chest at his words. All of the sudden, you regretted lying to the Supreme Leader about how your tablet was broken.

“Look, girl,” The man said to you, standing from his chair and walking past you to the counter where your cart was parked. “I don’t want to know how you managed to destroy your tablet on day one, but I would appreciate if you kept your clumsiness under control from here on out. Supreme Leader Ren was floored that we “allowed” you to work with a destroyed tablet. It  _ really  _ made us look bad.” You stepped out of his way as he took ahold of a box that had been sitting on the counter the entire time you had been here. You coughed as he shoved the box into your chest, took ahold of it and held on tight as he finally stepped away from you and allowed you to breathe.  _ You  _ made the entire kitchen look bad? Nobody wouldn’t have had any issues if the General hadn’t thrown your tablet across his living room. 

“I’m sorry.” You say quietly, feeling guilty even though you knew this wasn’t your fault. You didn’t even think it was worth it to argue your case. He was already pissed at you, and you were sure there was nothing you could say to change it.

“Don’t let it happen again. You’re dismissed.” He spoke so coldly as he stepped toward the door. At first you were relived. The conversation had left you drained and on edge and you were more than happy for it to end, but it hit you at the very last second, with your new tablet like a weight in your arms, you realized that you had no home.

“Wait, just one question?” You called out to him and he stopped in the doorway, craned his neck to look behind him at you. You felt bothersome, but felt it would be his best interest to answer your questions about your new home. “Where am I supposed to go? I--No one ever told me where I’m supposed to stay.”

The man’s eyebrows knit down and he was, yet again, rolling his eyes at you like you were a nuisance. “Use your tablet like you were taught, girl. I can’t help you.”

“Will it still have all of my information on it?” It did seem to be brand new, untouched and all of that. What if it didn’t have directions to your home?

“I don’t know. That was up to the manufacturing team, not to me.” He leaves just as coldly as he makes you feel, slamming the door behind him. You orientate the box in your arms so that you’re hugging it to your chest, hold your breath as you try and decide what to do. It would seem the only option you had was to hope that your new tablet could get you to the place you were supposed to be living on this massive ship.

By the time you exited the kitchen the hustle and bustle started back up in the halls, and even though you stood as close as you could to the wall people were still pushing and shoving past you and grumbling over their shoulders. You gave up apologizing after the fourth bump, and instead focused your attention on delving into your tablet. You were relieved when it turned on and greeted you with your alphanumeric name, and as you tapped into more familiar territory you found that your work schedule and pathway to the kitchen were all still there. It would seem all of your information had been transferred, now all you had to do was figure out where you would be staying. 

It felt like it took days for you to find the personal information section, and when you did you were horrified. There was a photo of you that you didn’t remember taking. Your face was washed out, your pupils were dilated, and the flash had highlighted what looked like tears on your cheeks. With your lips slightly parted it looked as if you had been caught completely off guard by the photo, and the ghastly photo of yourself with your empty, confused eyes caused goosebumps to break out over every inch of your skin. 

You scrolled down quickly, past your assigned name, past your height and weight, past your date of reconditioning and ‘estimated age’ of 25 and other random tidbits of information such as blood type, eye color, hair color, and assigned job. It seemed like they had an endless amount of information on you, and your assigned home address was mixed in at the very bottom.  _ 8th floor, dorm block 2B. Single room. No assigned roommate.  _

The 8th floor? If you remembered correctly you were on the 2nd floor. So you had to go up six more floors in order to make it home, and the hallways were already packed again. Your feet were hurting, your head was spinning with mixed emotions of anxiety, fear, and the unknown. You just wanted to rest, but it would seem there were six floors and two and a half dorm blocks in your way. You sighed, once again fumbling with your tablet to try and pull up some kind of GPS program to take you home, but the closet thing you could find was an interactive map. There was a list of places you could go on the floor you were currently on: The kitchen, bathrooms, offices, etc. You were happy to see that elevators were among the list of places you could get directions to, and when you tapped on it small red dots lit up among the light blue outlines of the hallways and other things the map felt was important to show you. From the small black dot that indicated where you were, it would seem the next closet elevator was just down the hall. You held your breath as you jumped into the stream of people all walking in the same direction that you needed to go to; surely this hike wouldn’t be as bad as you were making it out to be. 

But of course, like your entire first day on the job, everything was not as it would seem. 

There was a long line for the elevator, and it took you twenty minutes just to board it, and when you got on it stopped at each floor to let it even more people on. You ended up being trapped against the wall between a storm trooper and just a regular officer, and by the time the robotic voice announced you had reached the 8th floor you were squeezing your way out, pushing the other people out of your way so apologetically. You needed the fresh air. Feeling trapped between strangers you felt hated you for ten minutes had almost done you in. But when you finally came loose of the elevator, you were almost able to completely relax. 

The 8th floor was almost as grey and bland as your clothing was. There were no noises, no people, and no stimulations that would have further made you anxious. It was such a jarring change of pace, but after a few seconds you found it was welcome. You curled your bare toes into the short, stiff carpet for a few seconds and took in the scentless air. For once, you felt safe. You felt like no one was going to bother you up here on the 8th floor of the Supremacy. 

The only thing that caused you to come back to reality was the sound of boots coming your way. You looked up, heard the footsteps coming from the leftmost hall that, according to the signs hanging between the two halls, led to dorm block A and the  _ 8th Floor Lounge.  _ You had already gotten in trouble from standing around too much downstairs, and you certainly thought it was possible that you would still be reprimanded by whoever was coming around the corner. You ducked down the second hallway, down dorm block B where you had been promised your room would be. You never saw who was coming around the corner, mostly because when you saw the room labeled  _ 2B  _ your excitement went through the roof. You stepped up to the door and, just like with nearly every other door you had come in contact with that evening, it automatically opened. Even though you knew this place wasn’t home, being presented with a room to call your own, all alone where no one else could bother you was too good of an opportunity to pass up. This would be your home in the Order. This is where you could let your guard down and relax.

It was small. It was cold. It was grey and boring just like this entire 8th floor. When the lights came on a twin-sized bed and a small black dresser came into view on the far left wall, and on the other side was a kitchen that seemed to be 1 tenth of the size of the one you worked for. There was only a fridge, one counter, one sink, and a microwave mounted above the counter. There didn’t seem to be anything to actually cook with. In the opposite corner sat a small square table with just one chair, reminding you of the General’s personal quarters. There were no windows, no decorations, nothing that made this room seem like a home. Gingerly, you stepped into your minute home and took the ten steps to the fridge, opened it up and found it completely empty. A grimace settled over your face. You didn’t know how to cook, but you expected far more than this.

In between the smaller than life kitchen and the bed was a door, and upon opening it you discovered a bathroom that was the size of one of the utility closets you had seen while out and about. The sink was pushed up as close to the toilet as it could go, and the shower was contained to the corner of the room. Across from it was a rack with two black towels, and above the sink a mirror was hung that allowed you to look at yourself in real-time instead of through your ID photo. 

You still couldn’t believe that this was you. Your hair, your eyes, your nose, your lips. They didn’t feel like they were yours. You ran your hand over your face, caressing your lips and sliding them up to your ears, then to the bun that was tied tightly atop your head. It was knotted tightly with a thin piece of fabric that wasn’t easy to pull free, but when the fabric finally came loose and your hair went cascading down your neck, shoulders, and back, you felt like a huge part of yourself had been repressed this entire day. You smiled as you ran your fingers through your hair, coming to terms with the fact that, in your own personal space here, you could be whatever you wanted to be and you didn’t have to fully abide by the First Order’s rules. 

And the first thing you were going to do with your new found freedom was to strip yourself free of your bland, sweaty clothing you had been wearing this entire time. You hurry over to your bed and throw open the top drawer of the dresser you were provided only to be disappointed when you saw nothing but black folded clothing. You unpacked them, held them out in front of you and found that they it was a neatly pressed, professional looking black dress. It came down to your mid thigh and flowed like a flower. The top half buttoned up in the front with three large, round buttons and contained a cute white bow that was permanently sewn into the midsection. It wasn’t too bad, in fact your much preferred this over the clothing that you had discarded in a pile next to your dresser. This was more than likely your work uniform, and you found it quite amusing that the First Order wanted you to look this cute while you were delivering food.

The next drawer contained more casual attire that was only a bit more colorful than what you had seen. There were black yoga pants and black jeans, an assortment of black, white, and grey tank tops and T shirts, and two light grey sweaters. The last drawer contained a stack of underwear, three sets of silky pajamas--one long sleeved and one short sleeved with sleeping shorts--and a set of basic black slip on shoes. You seized the first set of pajamas and clothed yourself as quick as possible. 

The soft, smooth, buttery texture of the pajamas was to die for. You could even argue that wearing the pajamas was the most comfortable part of your day. You collapsed onto your bed. The mattress below you was cold, stiff, and hardly moved at all. It wasn’t ideal, but it wasn’t as if you could remember having anything different. You pulled out your datapad and brought it to life. In the silence by yourself you explored the ins and outs of your tablet, observed the general schedule of the base and learned that your meal blocks were assigned. Breakfast was served at the cafeteria on the 9th floor at 7 AM, lunch was served at 3 PM and dinner was served at 8 at the same cafeteria. A quick glance down at your clock revealed it was only 8:24, which meant it was your dinner hour. You thought about trying to find your way to the cafeteria, but ultimately determined that you were too comfortable here in your room to move. You weren’t too hungry anyway, and you thought spending some time by yourself to reflect on your first day was best. 

The most pressing issue on your mind was the memory you had experienced earlier that day. Try as you might, as hard as you strained to pull out every detail you could remember from what your own mind involuntarily played in front of you, you could not recall anything else. How could you have forgotten about your own mother? Even just from the small snippet of what you had seen of your old life you knew she had cared for you. The memory made you so warm and happy. Again, how could you just have had everything erased?

Time went by. Your surfed on your tablet after you had given up on forcing more memories to surface in your mind, and eventually you felt the exhaustion from overexerting yourself physically, mentally, and emotionally creeping up over your shoulder. You put your tablet to sleep and set it down on the small bedside table next to you before stretching out over your bed. Your arms barely had room to stretch above your head, and your legs became cramped against the foodboard of the bed. There wasn’t a lot of room for you, but it would have to do. You maneuvered your body awkwardly under the covers and then reached over to shut off your light. Tomorrow would be a good day to reassess your bedroom for its faults. For now, you needed your sleep.

That night, you dreamt of nothing but work. You were pushing your cart down a long, seemingly endless hallway that, of course, mirrored that of the General’s. At first you were leisurely strolling. You were relaxed, calm, carrying yourself without a care in the world. The sound of your cart wheels rolling along the linoleum floor filled your ears and even somewhat relaxed you, at least until your tablet beeped to alert you of your time constraint. You had one minute to get food to the General, and your anxiety was telling you that if you were late he would have your head. You immediately started running down the hall, frantically moving your head from side to side and trying to read the name plaques. You had seen the same few names each time: Officer Neils, Supreme Leader Ren, and Captain Phasma, but no General Hux. You could feel your heart pounding in your chest as the red numbers count down, faster and faster, quicker than actual seconds until the time actually struck zero. 

You were immediately stopped by a figure in the hallway, placing their hand on your cart and pushing you back. You shook as you gasped, looked up to the figure and was shocked to see that it wasn’t the General. It was The Supreme Leader standing tall and intimidatingly over you. He had your cart in one hand and the same weapon the General pointed at you in the other. Everything was silent as he raised the weapon toward you, and just as he squeezed the trigger and sent the projectile flying toward your forehead, you awoke in a drastically different environment.

“Get to your feet, Initiate!” Someone yelled at you as you tried to recenter yourself and bring yourself back to reality. It was pouring, every inch of you was wet and your clothes stuck uncomfortably to your wet skin. You could hear the most monstrous noises echoing all around you, coupled with the sound of large, heavy footsteps and gunfire. You lifted your head and could see red beams of light flying above you, coming in contact with the most atrocious beings you had ever seen. 

They looked like they were dead; literal deceased people running, screaming, and wilting all around you. Their skin was yellow, they looked as if they had no eyes and no teeth. Some had clothes that were torn to shreds, while others showed off the withered and torn skin with pride. What remained the same, however, was the way they would fall as the lasers made contact with their body. You sat up, only now realizing that you, too, had a weapon in your lap. You lifted it to observe it, to try and figure out how to defend yourself when you were yanked out of the cold mud by the back of your shirt by a pair of metallic fingers. 

“Shoot the ghouls, recruit!” Said a mechanical voice behind you, and when you turned around you were faced by a being that was much taller than you. They wore armored in a dark grey suit made entirely of metal, only leaving them vaguely humanoid. In their hands they held a minigun that they almost immediately started firing at the ghouls upon pulling you up out of the ground. Their helmet concealed their face, leaving only two big, bulbous black windows for eyes and a round muzzle for a mouth. The sounds, the sights, the smell of rotting and burning flesh left you feeling nauseous, and just as you turned and aimed your weapon at the attacking ghouls, another sound began to draw your attention

Just as soon as the flashback started, it ended; and it ended with the horrifying realization that you didn’t know how long you had been sitting here, perched on the side of your bed completely imagining these horrible things. You seized your tablet and brought it to life, feeling your breath stop in your chest as it read 7:45 AM. You were 45 minutes late for breakfast, and according to your work schedule you only had half an hour to make it to work. You bit back the urge to scream as you threw yourself off of the bed and into the small bathroom to get ready. This was your first full day of work, and you couldn’t mess it up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright. We're all caught up now. It was nice being able to post every week, but due to my third class starting up and being more intensive and time consuming than I thought it was going to be, I probably won't be able to post as regularly as I'd like. I've started the next chapter, but with all of my school work going on I don't know when I'm going to have time to work on it again. The semester ends in December, so while I don't think it's going to take that long to put out the next chapter, I believe I'll have more free time to write then.   
Thanks for reading!


	5. Chapter 4

Dressed in your brand new, cute looking uniform that, surprisingly, fit you just right, you sprinted all the way to the kitchen. You frantically looked from your tablet to the hallways trying to follow the map as best as you could, holding your breath as you stopped at every floor in between the 8th and the 2nd, letting people on and letting people off. By the time you were let off on the 2nd floor it was already 8:10 AM and you had five minutes to traverse your way through the halls. You made yourself as small as possible, squeezing yourself between the endless stream of people until you could see the turn your remembered walking around to get to the kitchen. As soon as there was a clearing you booked it, pushing yourself past the double doors that stated  _ staff only  _ in big red letters. Once again, the kitchen was booming. Flashes of black were gliding across the floor in front of you. Smells of every kind invaded your nostrils all at once, and the heat had almost blown you away. You looked at everything going on around you, reasoning with yourself that you had to fight your way through the kitchen to get to your cart.

You dragged your feet through the masses, dodging those with pots and pans full of various types of food until you got to the very end of the kitchen. Behind the doors the breakroom was empty, save for your food cart that seemed to be waiting patiently for you. As badly as you didn’t want to, you stepped toward it while bringing up your deliveries on your tablet. The General was due to get a bowl full of apple cinnamon oatmeal and a tall glass of orange juice at 9 AM, the Supreme Leader was having two slices of buttered toast and jam with a cup of coffee, Captain Phasma was having a sliced apple, pancakes, apple juice, and scrambled eggs, while the other two officers were having sausage, fried eggs, waffles, and coffee. Officer Neils was not on your list this time or last night for dinner, and you found yourself wondering why you had not delivered anything to him since the ice cream yesterday afternoon. 

The time allotted you ten minutes between each delivery, so you would be done by 9:40 AM. Your stomach growled uncomfortably as you set your tablet upon your cart. As you pushed yourself back into the kitchen you wondered how unreasonable it would be to ask for a small plate just for yourself. After all, you read that this cafeteria produced food for the first, second, third, and fourth floors. This had to mean they produced a lot of food, and not all of it could have possibly been eaten in one day. Maybe you could ask when you returned. The worst they could say was no.

All of the food was loaded up, including the coffee pot that was placed in the warm section of the cart, and soon you were on your way. You walked diligently along the redline to the General’s home, and with a minute and 40 seconds left to spare you reminded yourself of what he expected of you: Knock, don’t just enter. Don’t panic. Set out his drink as quickly as you can after his food. Again,  _ don’t panic.  _ There was nothing to be afraid of because you knew everything now. You could do this flawlessly. You were sure of it. 

You stepped up to his door and knocked as loudly as you could, ignoring the telltale sign of the lock coming loose. He didn’t want you to just enter, but everyone else didn’t care. He, you thought, was the most difficult person on your route. But he was only one person; you simply couldn’t let yourself be so afraid of just him. But as soon the door opened and tall, redheaded man was standing disapprovingly in front of you, you started to doubt your confidence.

“Good morning, General.” You said, but he simply stepped aside and allowed you to pull your cart into his home. He was dressed up in his uniform just as he was yesterday, but still carried a tense, unapproachable look about him. You could feel his eyes angrily on your back as you pulled up to the side of his table, and when you bent down to retrieve his plate clicked his tongue at you, stopping you cold in your tracks.

“Do not serve me until I’ve sat at the table.” He said, and when you turned around you saw him rubbing his eyes. The man was tired, which more than likely put him in an even worse mood. The demand seemed unreasonable since you were here on time specifically for this reason. A quick glance at your tablet told you that you had nine minutes left until you had to get across the hall to the Supreme Leader, and you would rather not have to stand around waiting for him to decide when he was ready to eat. Generally speaking, wasn’t  _ he  _ the one that decided what time this entire hall ate? He should have known you were coming at nine and you thought it was incredibly rude to make you wait like this.

You watched him walk around his living area, his arms tightly wound behind his back as he looked over the various decorations that stood in his living room. He picked a few up artifacts and took a closer look, wiped some dust off with his fingers until he had made a full lap around his living room, back at the table where he finally pulled out his chair and sat down. You were fuming inside. It seemed like he had done all of that for no reason other than to stretch his authority over you. It infuriated you, but in the end there was nothing you could do other than to serve him. 

Taking another glance at his order you retrieved his meal and utensils, set them down in front of him before grabbing a clean glass and the pitcher of orange juice. You set them both down in front of him and stepped away only to have him snap his fingers at you. “Yes, General?” You asked, wondering what you could have forgotten. 

“Pour my juice, you forgetful maid.” You felt your cheeks heating at the insult. He hadn’t asked you to pour his drink last night. Although, while you were pouring the juice you realized if more than one person who ordered orange juice it wouldn’t have been very smart to leave the pitcher in someone's home. With a stone-cold look on your face, you picked up the pitcher and filled his glass, allowing him this one victory over you. This was the one time you would admit that your assumption was wrong. 

You stepped back as he placed his spoon within his oatmeal and lifted it to his lips, then continued to eat a little bit of everything before he waved you off. “Dismissed.” He said callously. Relief washed over you as you turned as quick as you could, scurrying out of his home and into the hallway where you were tempted to lean against the wall and take a breather like you did yesterday, but your run today was already going much better than it did yesterday, and you thought the Supreme Leader would have a busy day ahead of him. He was the  _ Supreme Leader  _ after all. His title spoke volumes of him. You thought he was a busy man, just like the rest of the people you delivered food to, and he wouldn’t want to wait for his breakfast. So with your heart calming down to its regular rhythm, you held your head up high as you pushed your cart up to his door.

Yesterday he seemed confused by the fact that you knocked, and the other two people down the hall did as well. So when you approached the door and heard it unlock you simply let yourself in. His home was the same as yesterday, and you didn’t expect anything different. “Good morning, Supreme Leader Ren.” You called out nervously. You didn’t see him right away, didn’t know if he wanted you to leave his food in the kitchen like last time or if he expected you to wait for him to make his presence known. You watched the clock count down the minutes you had to get to Captain Phasma’s home to deliver her food. With your allotted ten minutes counting down, you thought it would be best to just leave his food in his kitchen like yesterday. After all, he had only ordered two pieces of toast, whatever that was. With eight minutes left to spare to get across the hall, you began pushing your cart into his kitchen and lifted each cover until you came to the plain, brown pieces of toast that had been cut diagonally. A small dish of butter was set to the side along with a small, red, gelatinous scoop of jelly next to it. It seemed so plain, but you were so hungry you were even willing to try everything that sat before you even though you didn't know what it was. You lifted his food from the warmer, and just as you were about to place it on his sink you heard footsteps coming from behind you.

He came from around the corner dressed much more modestly in a pair of thick black jeans, his boots, and a black undershirt this time. His hair was disheveled, he still wore a bored scowl on his face while both of his hands were hard at work. One hand held his toothbrush in his mouth while the other held his own tablet. He was deep in concentration, viewing whatever he was looking at with his eyes unmoving from the screen. He didn’t seem to pay you any mind at first, walking right up to you and took the plate from your hands.

“Thought I felt someone enter my home.” He said, still not exactly paying attention to you. You felt hurt and confused by his words. You felt like he had invited you to just enter his home when he scolded Hux for expecting you to knock.

“I’m sorry.” You said, trembling and thinking you couldn’t handle any more awkwardness and embarrassment for the rest of the day. “I’ll knock next time.” You say hurriedly. If he were going to reprimand you just like Hux did that morning, you’d rather not stick around. 

“No need. I just felt like I should be here if you’re here.” He still looked distant and uninterested, and he still was not looking at you. But his words were rather light and friendly. They put you at ease as he walked away toward his table. 

“Well, I think I’m meant to serve you, so I think it would be better too.” You said as confidently as you could, but you got no reaction. You followed behind him at a distance, watched him sit before remembering that he had no utensils. Without saying anything you sprinted into the kitchen and retrieved one of every utensil, even though you were sure he wouldn’t need a spoon and a fork, but you didn’t want to be reprimanded. He placed the toothbrush down next to his plate and was still nose deep in his tablet, didn’t really seem to take notice of your deeds. In the end, you smiled as you watched him, with one large hand, dip his knife in the butter before spreading it on half of his toast. You only knew the extras were called ‘butter’ and ‘jelly’ from hearing the cooks shout at each other in the kitchen. You could hardly guess what they tasted like. 

“Go ahead and go.” He said, placing his buttered knife down on the table and pulling his spoon into the jelly. You were content with the dismissal, walking leisurely back into the kitchen to retrieve your cart. You had five full minutes to get to Captain Phasma’s home where you would be serving her for the first time. You thought you could use the extra time to regroup your thoughts. She and Lieutenant Farris weren’t terrible to you, but you could tell that the leaders of this organization ran this place with a rod of iron. You started to cart yourself out when Ren suddenly spoke up, capturing your attention right as the door automatically opened.

“Wait,” He said. When you turned around you saw him eyeing the small tin of jelly suspiciously. “This isn’t the right kind of jelly.”

“I’m sorry?” You asked, turning to face him. This was the first time an order hadn’t been correct, and you hadn’t the slightest idea how Ren was going to react or what you were supposed to do.

“I ordered blueberry jelly, not strawberry jelly.” He spoke, lifting the tin and examining it closely. How he could tell was beyond you. They both looked the same in your eyes.

“Oh, I’m sorry, Supreme Leader.” You gulped, unsure of where to go from here. As per usual, you were not trained for this and you didn’t know what you were supposed to do to fix the situation. “Um, would you, would you like me to go and get you what you need?” You offered as kindly as you could. You didn’t think he would lash out at you, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t capable of doing so. 

“No need.” He said without even looking up at you. “You have things to do, I can have someone else bring me some.” His voice was so soft, so, uninterested in you. You loved it. After being subjected to what the General had done and said to you it was a nice change of pace. Ren actually was considering what you had to do after them, unlike Hux who pranced around his home freely knowing you had more people to deliver to. You stepped back, observed him from behind as he picked up his tablet and began the process of ordering a new tin of jelly. You shot a look back at your cart and suddenly remembered he had ordered something else as well.

“Oh, your coffee.” You said, hurrying over to the cart and reaching into the warming section for the pot. Your hand darted to the side and grabbed a mug, then, as carefully as you could, stepped up to the table and began to pour his coffee for him. 

“Nothing extra. You’re dismissed.” He breathed, still giving his tablet his undivided attention. 

“Are, are you sure you don’t want me to fetch--”

“I said you’re dismissed.” Your jaw flew shut as he cut off your speech. By no means was he forceful, but you could tell you were just beginning to tread on thin ice. Out of everyone you had delivered to on your route, Kylo was the most pleasant. You almost wished you could have just spent all your time delivering to him. You just didn’t want to leave him and go to the next three homes where they would expect you to do everything for them. 

“Right away, Supreme Leader.” You didn’t hesitate this time, offering him a small apology while you backed away. You supposed this was your job, your assigned and designated position and it didn’t matter how you were treated. The First Order didn’t care. That had been made abundantly clear to you. You grasped the bars of your cart and began to push it toward the door. A quick glance at your tablet told you that you only had one minute to get next door, and that you’d better not waste too much more time annoying the Supreme Leader. Clearly he liked being alone, and he didn’t need you. The door opened just as you suspected it to and you found yourself scurrying out as quickly as you could. 

The rest of your deliveries went as smoothly as they could go. Captain Phasma, as usual, sat at her table on a holocall as you silently set her food down in front of her, only giving you a short wave to dismiss you. The other two weren’t much different. As you showed yourself out of Farris’ home your stomach continued to growl. It was going on ten AM, and you literally could not remember the last time you had eaten. You felt as light as a feather, lightheaded, as if you would simply float away if you let go of the cart. It wasn’t a good feeling, and you knew you desperately needed food when you nearly pushed your cart into someone and, when you looked up at them, saw two of them fade into one. Double vision wasn’t a good sign, and it made you nauseous as you backed yourself up and tried to reorientate. 

“Excuse me.” You whispered, staring straight ahead at them and watching the two halves of them become whole. The black hair became apparent firstly, but by the time she had become a whole person again, you had instantly recognized the girl who stood before you as your one and only friend. “Oh. Hi, again.” You smiled at her as best as you could, but she didn’t seem to share your same enthusiasm. Her skin had always been pale to you, but today it looked even paler. Her green eyes shone brightly in what little light existed around you because she held them wide, and her lips were parted just slightly. In her hands sat a small tin of what looked to be jelly like what the Supreme Leader had, only a much deeper blue. She must have been sent to deliver him his correct jelly. 

“I’m, I’m reporting to, to…” She stuttered, looking back and forth as she tried to find her words. “Supreme, Su--Supreme Leader Kylo Ren.” Her voice cracked as she spoke the man’s title, and you were vastly confused as she took a deep breath and her eyes started to water. 

“Is, is everything okay?” You asked, your face falling into a look of concern. A single tear fell from her eye and rolled down her cheek; she didn’t even look this terrified on your first day in the kitchen together. 

“They told me he’s ruthless.” Her lower lip quivered, and it was clear she wanted to meltdown. “They told me he would hurt me if I didn’t do it perfectly!”

“Who? The Supreme Leader?” You asked her. You were astounded that she would say something like that about the Supreme Leader. If that was said about the General you would understand. But Supreme Leader Ren? He was the only person you looked forward to on your route, and she was telling you he was dangerous. She nodded her head, and you watched as more tears poured down her cheeks. You pitied her, and you couldn’t just let her stand here and cry over nothing. 

Again, something from inside of you took over as you let go of the cart and stepped up to her, wrapping your arms around her tight. You felt like you needed to comfort her, and what better way than to tell her about your experience with Ren?

“He’s not that bad.” You said as she cried on your shoulder. Her arms tightened around you and she held onto you like her life depended on it.

“I don’t want to die.” She whispered, and you couldn’t stop the small giggle that was born from your throat. 

“Die? You aren’t going to die.” You pulled away from her and offered her a reassuring smile. “Supreme Leader Ren isn’t scary. If you want to see scary you should see General Hux.  _ He’s  _ scary. Ren’s been nothing but nice to me.” You pushed the harsh tones and the fact that he had snatched your tablet from your hands to the back of your mind. You wanted to reassure her, not scare her further. 

“They told me he kills people.” She sniffed, bringing her sleeve up and wiping her eyes. 

“Well, I’ve never seen him kill anyone. I’m sure you’ll be alright.” The sides of her lips just barely quirked up at your joke, but she still didn't seem convinced. 

“Are you done your run?” She asked drearily. 

“Yeah, I’m on my way back to the kitchen now. I’m kinda hungry, I missed breakfast.” She giggled at you, wiped her eyes again while looking past your head. 

“Overslept? I did that too. Just too nervous about my first full day.” You were happy to hear that you weren’t the only one to have done such a silly thing, although you couldn’t say that you were sleeping. “Um, I can get you something to nibble on until lunch. I don’t get mine until 3.”

“Really? On the 9th floor?” She nodded her head. “Me too!” For the first time since you met her in the halls, she gave you a genuinely excited smile. You reached to her and hugged her again, thinking you had officially made a friend in the Order. You exchanged goodbyes, assuring her that you would be found in the break room as soon as you got back to the kitchen, then parted ways. You rolled your cart forward, listening contently as her footsteps disappeared behind you. Other than your growling belly, you thought everything was alright in your world. At least until your vision once again started to disappear.

You were thrown from the hallways onto a battlefield just as you were abruptly placed on that morning. You could feel the pouring rain beating down on you, could feel the mud seeping into your boots, and could hear the gunfire going off around you. In your arms you held a woman that was barely clinging to life. You pressed your hand into the bleeding wound in her neck, and cried as you knew this was the end of her On her head was a hood that had a pair of goggles attached, and you had to peel away the red turtleneck sweater in order to get to her wound. You didn’t know what happened to her, or what was going to happen to you. All you could do was sit there and sob as her skin turned paler and paler, and she grew colder and colder there in your arms. 

“Haylen.” You whispered. “Haylen, I love you!” She didn’t seem to react to your declaration of love. The life was now fully drained from her eyes, and you knew she was officially gone. You broke down into tears as you dropped your head to her neck, pressing your forehead into the good side of her before deciding you needed one last kiss before you could say goodbye. You shook the entire way to her lips, could barely even find the strength to pucker yours the correct way and ended up just lightly resting your lips onto hers. You didn’t know this woman presently, but obviously in your fragmented memories she was greatly important to you. 

“What the hell are you doing?” Said a deep, monotonic, manly voice. Suddenly you were opening your eyes to find a helmeted Kylo Ren standing right in front of you.

“Supreme Leader!” You cried, stepping back so quickly that you lost your footing. Your hands slammed on the cart handles as you fell back, but it only rolled with you down to the floor. You gasped, held your eyes shut as you waited for your body to hit the floor, embarrassing yourself in front of the Supreme Leader. But that never happened. While gravity pulled your body to the floor, the cart had abruptly stopped moving and you found yourself simply hovering in the air, the cart handles held tight by your hands. When you opened your eyes you were shocked to see that Ren was holding the other side of the cart, succeeding in stopping you from hitting the ground. You were speechless, didn’t know what to say to him as the two of you had an awkward stare off in the middle of his residential block.

“Th--thank you, Supreme Leader.” You said, moving quickly to your feet and readjusting yourself. He let go of the cart, his emotionless mask staring you down in the most judgemental way. For a moment, you thought your new friend had been telling you the truth. That maybe he was ruthless and he was about to kill you for whatever he thought you were doing in the hall. It was nervewracking, and you almost wanted to turn around and run away from him as fast as you could.

“Don’t let me catch you daydreaming on the job again.” He said, lifting his hand and pointing a gloved finger in your face. Just twenty minutes ago he was so chill and so understanding, but now he was demanding and full of authority. It was such a change of pace, and you realized that he, just like General Hux, was to be feared. Your friend was right. She had to be careful. 

“Yes sir.” You affirmed, standing up straight and taking a hold of your cart again. “Back to work right away, sir.” You said as you steered the cart around him, back toward the kitchen. You wondered where he was going. He must have come from his home that was behind you, and for all you knew he was going to follow you. In fact, as you scurried away you could feel his eyes glued to the back of your head, and you knew he was in charge. You held your breath as you took the second right out of his neighborhood and continued on your way to the kitchen, following the route your tablet took you and hoping he still wasn't behind you. You tossed a cautionary look over your shoulder as you rounded the corner to find him still standing where he had approached you; you had successfully gotten away. You high tailed it to the kitchen, couldn’t wait to tell your new friend that you were wrong. 


End file.
